Cotton-seed linter.



G. H. FULSON.

COTTON SEED LINTER. APPLIIQATION FILED JUNE-9, 1910.

Patented Oct. 17, 1911.

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COTTON SEED LINTER. APPLICATION IILED JUNE 9,- 1910.

1,005,955. Patented Oct. 17,1911.

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Wc'zesaes- Iwezdan G. H. PULSON. COTTON SEED LINTER.

APPLICATION FILED JUNE 9, 1910.

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CHARLES HIRAM FULSON, OF WEST MONROE, LOUISIANA, ASSIGNOR 0F ONE-HALF TOJOHN W. TODD, OF NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA.

COTTON-SEED LINTER.

Specification of Letters Patent.

Patented Oct. 17, 1911.

To all whom it may concern."

Be it known that 1, CHARLES H. FULsoN, a citizen of the United States,and resident of Test Monroe, parish of Ouachita, State of Louisiana,have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Cotton-SeedLinters; and I do hereby declare the following to be a full, clear, andexact description of the invention, such as will enable others skilledin the art to which it appertains to make and use the same.

This invention relates to cotton seed linters, and more particularly toapparatus of this character in which a plurality of rolls of cotton seedare rotated in contact with the same linting or saw cylinder. In anapplication filed January 20, 1910, Serial No. 539,146, I have describeda linter of this kind, wherein the bodies of seed may be rotated incontact with the linting cylinder by means of ordinary floats arrangedat different points in the periphery of the cylinder, such floats beinginclosed in separate chambers or cylinders through which the seed ispassed in succession. The linter shown in the drawings of theapplication in question is designed to receive the seed to be treated inthe upper float cylinder and to discharge it at one end of the lowerfloat cylinder, though the invention is not limited to this specific.operation.

The object of the present invention, in one of its aspects, is toprovide a linter in which the seed takes a course through the machinediflerent from that in the above mentioned machine, with a view toincreasing the capacity of the linter by increasing the inlet anddischarge area and the ease with which the body of seed passes throughthe machine.

From another aspect the invention seeks to provide a machine in whichthe discharge from each float chamber and from the machine as a wholekeeps pace exactly with the feeding in of additional seed. This isaccomplished by causing the seed to traverse the machine in thedirection opposed to the force of gravity, the seed passing out of eachfloat chamber by a sort of overflowing action, so that a full dense rollmust be formed in each float chamber before the discharge from thatchamber commences to take place. In this way, the seed is properly heldagainst the saws in a dense compact mass, so that a proper lintingaction is absolutely neces- 1, and Fig. 4: is a detail perspective viewof one of the discharge spouts and its controlling gate.

Referring to the drawings, the end frames 5 of the machine may be of anysuitable construction, and extending between them and suitably journaledtherein is a linting cylinder 6 which preferably consists of a largenumber of closely grouped saws, as previously intimated, said saws beingmounted on a shaft 7 It is to be understood that the mounting of the sawcylinder in the machine frame is not shown in detail because it forms nopart of the invention, which concerns itself chiefly with the means forpresenting the cotton seed to the saws and for discharging the seed fromthe machine after the lint has been removed therefrom. After the linthas been taken off from the seed by the saw teeth it is, of

course, striped off from such saw teeth in any suitable way, but as thisfeature is likewise immaterial to the invention, I have not illustratedthe means for removing the lint from the saw teeth.

On top of the frame is mounted a feed hopper or casing 8, into which theseed to be treated is discharged from the chute 9, and within the feedhopper rotates the usual feed roll 10, mounted on a shaft 11 extend ingout of said hopper at one end, as shown in Fig. 1. The feed roll 10controls the discharge of the seed from the ends of the feed hopper 8,by way of discharge spouts 12, into upright spouts or hoppers 13arranged at the front of the machine and delivering the seed into theends of a linter casing 14: supported by and extending between the endframes 5. The linter casing is divided into an upper float chamber orcylinder 15 and a lower float chamber or cylinder 16. The under part ofthe linter casing 14 is cut away to fit over the linting cylinder 6, asshown in Fig. 3, the bottom of said casing having an opening 17 Withinwhich a part of the linting cylinder enters. -Within the casing is agrate 18 having ribs extending between the individual saws, andextending upward from the grate, at points between the saws, are 5projections 19 which support a common division board or partition 20,which division board separates the float chambers 15, 16. The divisionboard is provided at its intermediate portion with an opening 21 toafford 1 communication between the respective float chambers, for apurpose which will presently appear. The float chambers are arranged todifferent heights, as shown, and the upper chamber is equipped with anordinary rotary float or beater 22, while a similar float 23 operates inthe lower float chamber. At the ends of the upper float chamber,preferably at the upper portion thereof, are discharge openings 24 whichmay conveniently be cut in the end walls of the linter casing,

as shown in Figs. 3 and 4. Leading downward from these dischargeopenings are discharge chutes or spouts 25 arranged at the respectiveends of the machine and pref- 25 erably applied to the end walls of thelinter casing, as shown. The ends of the lower float 23 are providedwith oppositely directed screws or conveyor flights 26, 26 as shown inFig. 1, which flights feed the seed 3o deposited in the end portions ofthe lower float chamber (by means of the spouts or hoppers 13) towardthe center of said chamber where the opening 21 in the division board orpartition is located. The lower float is likewise equipped at its endswith driving pulleys 27 and similar pulleys 28 are carried by the endsof the upper float 22, as shown in Figs. 1 and 2. These pulleys areapplied to the respective float shafts, which are suitably journaled inthe end walls of the linter casing, at the exterior of such casing, andthey are driven by power belts 29, 30 at opposite ends of the machine(Figs. 2 and 3). These belts are driven by pulleys 31, 32 respectively,on an overhead shaft 33, and they pass around the driving pulleys of thefloats in the manner shown in Fig. 2.

In order to tension the driving belts properly, tension pulleys 34 areemployed, one in connection with each belt, As these pulleys are mountedand operated in substantially the same way, a description of one of themwill suffice. Each tension pulley 34 is journaled in a forwardlyextending lever 35 pivoted at 36 to the corresponding end frame 5. Saidlever carries a yoke 36* and the respective ends of the stud shaft 37are journaled in the lever 35 and the yoke 36 It is obvious, therefore,that when the driving belt passes around the several pulleys in themanner shown in Fig. 2, an upward. movement of the lever 35 on its pivot36 will raise the tension pulley and cause a tightening of the belt,whereas a lowering of said lever will depress the tension pulley 34 andthereby relieve the tension on the belt. The lever may be held in thedesired adjusted position by means of an upright bar or rod 38 risingfrom a bracket 39 applied to the adjacent end frame. The upper part ofthis bar or rod is provided with rack teeth 40 with which a pin 41carried by the extremity of the lever 35 may be engaged to hold thelever at the desired elevation, as will be manifest.

In some instances I find it expedient to 5 drive the feed roll 10 fromone of the tension pulleys. In this case, the stud shaft 37 of one ofthe tension pulleys may be provided with a sprocket 42, as shown at theleft of Fig. 1, and over this sprocket runs a chain 43 which drives thefeed roll 11 by means of a larger sprocket 44 mounted on the extendedend of said shaft. The sprocket 44 is loose on the shaft 11 and it has agrooved roller 45 made solid therewith and also 5 freely rotatable onthe shaft 11. A similar grooved roller 46 is permanently fixed to theshaft alongside the roller 45, and both of these rollers are adapted tobe engaged by the end disks or flanges 47, 48 respectively of a sleeve49 freely rotatable on a stud shaft 50 carried by a lever 51 pivoted at52 to the end wall of the feed hopper 8 or to any suitable fixed part ofthe machine. The lever 51 can be raised and lowered manually in order toengage and disengage the disks 47, 4S and the grooved rollers 45,

46, respectively, and it is obvious that when the lever is lowered andthere is no engagement between the rollers and disks, the rotation ofthe sprocket 44 by the rotating tension pulley and the connectionspreviously described will have no effect on the feed roll shaft 11, onwhich said sprocket is freely rota-table under these conditions. If,however, the lever 51 is raised in order to engage the disks 47, 48 withthe grooved rollers 45,

46, the rotation imparted to the sprocket 44 will, through theengagement of the roller 45 and disk 47, rotate the sleeve 49, with theresult that the disk 48 is rotated in contact with the fixed roller 46on the feed roll shaft, so that the latter is rotated, and with it thefeed roll 11.

The discharge openings 24 of the upper float chamber are closed by gateswhich preferably comprise blocks or panels 53 carried by pivot-ed levers54. The-levers 54 of both gates are mounted on a common shaft 55 mountedfor rocking movement in suitable bearings 56 carried by the framework ofthe machine, as shown in Fig. 4.

By fixing both levers to the shaft, a movement of one gate with respectto its discharge opening 24 will eflfect a similar movement of the othergate at the same time, whereby both discharge openings are controlledsimultaneously and in the same manner. When the gates are opened and thelevers 54 are raised, the lever at the left of the machine (Fig. 1) maybe caught under the stud shaft lever 51 in order to hold said last-namedlever in such a position that the sleeve will engage the rollers 45, 46on the feed roll shaft.

The operation of the machine is substantially as follows: The cottonseed to be linted is fed into the feed hopper 8 by means of the supplychute 9, and the rotation of the feed roll 10 will feed the seed fromsaid hopper into the two end chutes 12, whence it falls into the spoutsor hoppers 13 that discharge into the ends of the lower float chamber16. The floats 22, 23 are rotated by the power belts 29, 30, aspreviously indicated, the tension of said belts being properly regulatedby adjusting the levers 35 into the required position. The feed roll isdriven from one of the tension pulleys 34 by means of the chain andsprocket mechanism hereinbefore described, it being necessary, however,in order to produce the rotation of the feed roll shaft by the loosesprocket 44, to have the sleeve 51 with its disks or flanges held inengagement with the rollers 45, 46'by supporting the lever 51 on one ofthe pivoted gates. The seed introduced into the ends of the lower floatchamber is conveyed toward the center of said chamber by means of thescrew conveyers 26, 26*. In passing toward the center of the floatchamber, the body of seed is worked into a dense roll, which is rotatedby the float 23 in contact with the teeth of the rotating saws. In thisway, a considerable amount of the lint is taken off by the saws at thisstage of the operation, and the lint is removed from the saw teeth inany suitable way. The seed which is passed from both ends of the lowerfloat chamber to the intermediate part of the same is forced, by

the action of the conveyers and the rotation of the saws, through theopening 21 in the division board or partition 20 and int-0 the centralor intermediate part of the upper float chamber. The pressure of theincoming seed is suflicient to form a dense roll in this upper floatchamber also, which roll is rotated in contact with the saws at anotherpoint. in opposite directions toward the respective ends of the upperfloat chamber at the same time that the aforesaid rotary motion is givento it by the upper float 22. and when said chamber is. completely filledwith seed the latter begins to overflow and pass out of the dischargeopenings 24 at the opposite ends of the chamber, as will be understood.The seed thus discharged has, therefore, traveled over the periphery ofthe linting cylinder at two different points, and it has had to travel acertain allotted distance over the saws, so that when it issues from theopenings or outlets 24 all of the desirable lint has been removed fromthe same. The

The seed in this body or roll passes and since the top of the upper rollis free to swell or expand above the discharge openings 24, the materialwill discharge just as fast as it is introduced into the machine. This,of course, is an important advantage. By discharging at the top of thetop roll and at the ends of the same, the discharge of the seed is madeindependent of the saw spacing, as previously explained, so that a largenumber of saws may be grouped on the linting cylinder withoutinterfering with the discharge of the seed. The discharge at the endsalso prevents the float cylinders from becoming empty at any time, forif the feed is stopped by accident or otherwise, the discharge from theopenings 24 will likewise be arrested and the rolls in the machine willcontinue to rotate in contact with the saws, whereby the effective workof the machine is continued. As soon as the discharge of the seed isstopped, by closing the gates 53, 54, the feed is stopped automatically.Both of the gates are moved simultaneously, as explained, and as soon asthe gate at the left of the machine (Fig. 1) is lowered the lever 51carrying the flanged sleeve 49 is allowed to drop in a downwarddirection, thereby moving the sleeve out of cooperation of the groovedrollers on the feed shaft. This, of course, causes the sprocket 44 to berotated loosely 011 the feed shaft, which is no longer driven and whichcomes to a stop and discontinues the feed. Hence it will be noted thatthe members 45, 46 and 51 form parts of a clutch which is clutched inwhen the closures of the discharge outlets are open and disengaged whenthey are closed.

Perhaps one of the most important features of the invention is the factthat the seed passes from the lower to the upper roll '5. 6., in adirection opposed to the force of gravity. As a consequence, the seedwill only pass out of the lower float chamber into the upper one afterit has accumulated therein to such an extent as to reach thecomparatively high level of the opening 21, in the division board.Accordingly no discharge from the lower float chamber will take theplace until a dense compact roll has been formed such as is necessary toeffect a thorough linting action. This is also true of the upper floatchamber, from which the seed cannot be discharged until it reaches thelevelof the discharge openings 24, which are at the top of the roll. Itwill be understood that if the feed is slow the seed cannot pass throughthe machine without be ing effectively linted, and this is a result ofthe highest importance wherein my linter is distinguished from theordinary linters now on the market. The seed must accumulate in thefloat chambers until the latter are filled, before any discharge canpossibly take place, and during the time that the seed is being workedup into compact dense rolls of the required character, the saws areobviously doing effective work on the seed. Hence the invention providesa machine which does especially effective linting or delinting andwherein the feeding in of seed and the discharging thereof keep pacewith each other automatically within certain limits. In the ordinarylinter special care must be exercised to feed in seed in correspondencewith the discharge, and this is a difficult matter, but in the presentmachine the feeding in of seed does not necessitate such constant careand supervision on the part of the operator.

It is obvious that numerous features of my invention are capable ofindependent use, and that I have not attempted to de scribe all of thevarious modifications of the construction that might be adopted withoutdigressing from my inventive idea.

hat I claim is 1. In a cotton seed linter, a linting cylinder, upper andlower seed chambers associated therewith at different points in theperiphery thereof and in communication with each other, and means tofeed the seed through said chambers in a direction opposed to the forceof gravity.

2. In a cotton seed linter, a linting cylinder, a float chamberassociated therewith, and into the opposite ends of which the seed isfed, and a second float chamber in connection with the linting cylinderand in communication with said first-named chamber, the seed beingdischarged from the ends of said second chamber.

3. In a cotton seed linter, a linting cylinder, seed chambers associatedtherewith at different points in the periphery of said cylinder and incommunication with each other intermediate of their ends, means to feedthe seed into one of said seed chambers, and means to discharge the seedfrom both ends of the other seed chamber.

seed from the intermediate portion of one roll to the intermediateportion of the other roll.

6. In a cotton seed linter, a lintingoylinder, means to rotate separaterolls of seed in contact with said cylinder at different points in itsperiphery, means to feed seed to the ends of one roll, means to conductthe seed from the intermediate part of one roll to the intermediate partof the other, and means to discharge the seed at both ends of the secondroll.

7. In a cotton seed linter, a linting cylinder,v means for rotatingupper and lower rolls of seed in contact with said cylinder, means tofeed in seed at the ends of the lower roll, means to permit seed to passfrom the lower to the upper roll, and means to discharge said seed atthe ends of the upper roll.

8. The combination of a linting cylinder, upper and lower float chambersin communication with each other, rotary floats in said chambers, meansto feed seed into the ends of the lower chamber, and means to dischargeseed from the ends of the upper chamber.

9. The combination of a delinting cylinder, a linter casing partiallyinclosing said cylinder, a division board in said casing dividing thesame into two float chambers and having an opening intermediate of itslength to establish communication between said chambers, and rotaryfloats in the respective chambers.

10. In a cotton seed linter, a linting cylinder, upper and lower floatchambers in connection therewith and in communication with each otherintermediate of their ends, floats operating in said chambers, means tofeed seed into the ends of the lower float chamber, and means todischarge seed from the ends of the upper float chamber.

11. In a cotton seed linter, a linting cylinder, means to rotateseparate rolls of seed in contact with said cylinder at different pointsin the periphery thereof, means to conduct the seed from theintermediate portion of one roll to the intermediate portion of theother roll, and means to supply the seed to and discharge it from theends of the respective rolls.

12. In a cotton seed linter, a linting cylinder, means to rotate anupper and a lower roll of seed in contact with said cylinder atdifferent points in the periphery thereof, means to conduct the seedfrom the lower roll to the upper roll, means to feed seed to the lowerroll, and means to discharge the seed from the top of the upper roll.

13. In a cotton seed linter, a linting cylinder, means to rotate anupper and a lower roll of seed in contact with said cylinder atdiflerent points in the periphery thereof, means to feed seed to thelower roll, means to conduct seed from the intermediate portion of thelower roll to the intermediate portion of the upper roll, and means todischarge the seed from the upper end portions of the upper roll.

14:. In a cotton seed linter, a linting cylinder, means to rotate upperand lower rolls of seed in contact therewith, means to feed seed to therespective ends of the lower roll, and means to afl'ord communicationbetween the intermediate portions of the respective rolls, the lintedseed being discharged from the top of the upper roll, as described.

15. In a cotton seed linter, a linting cylinder, upper and lower floatchambers in connection therewith and in communication with each otherintermediate of their ends, floats operating in said chambers, means tosupply seed to the lower float chamber, and means to permit a dischargeof seed from icjhe top of the roll in the upper float cham- 16. In acotton seed linter, a casing, a linting cylinder j ournaled therein,upper and lower float chambers associated with said cylinder and havingcommunication with each other, floats operating in said chambers, a feedhopper above the machine, means to supply seed from said hopper into theends of the lower float chamber, and means to discharge the seed fromthe upper portion of the upper float chamber.

17. In a cotton seed linter, a casing, a linting cylinder journaledtherein, upper and lower float chambers associated with said cylinderand in communication with each other intermediate of their ends, floatsoperating in said chambers, a feed hopper at the top of the machine,spouts for discharging seed :trom the hopper into the ends of the lowerfloat chamber, and discharge chutes leading from the ends of the upperfloat chamber.

18. In a cotton seed linter, a linting cylinder, float chambersassociated therewith and in communication intermediate of their ends,floats in the respective chambers, means to supply seed into the endportions of one of said chambers, and conveyer flights associated withthe end portions of the float in that chamber, and acting to move theseed toward the center of the chamber.

19. The combination with a float chamher having discharge openings, ofclosures in connection with the respective openings, and meansconnecting said closures to cause a simultaneous movement thereof.

20. The combination, in a cotton seed linter, of a rotary feed roll tofeed seed into the machine, a discharge preventing closure, and means toarrest the rotation of the feed roll when the discharge of seed is cutoff by said closure.

21. In a cotton seed linter, a rotary feed roll, a manually operablegate to cut ofl the discharge of seed, and a feed roll clutch controlledby said gate.

22. In a cotton seed linter, a feed roll shaft, rotary float shaftshaving pulleys, a power belt to drive said pulleys, a tension pulley forthe belt, and a direct driving con nection between said tension pulleyand the feed roll shaft, to rotate the latter.

In testimony whereof I afiix my signature, in presence of two witnesses.

CHARLES HIRAM FULSON.

Witnesses:

J. MURPI-IEY, P. D. SMITH, J r.

Copies of this patent may be obtained for five cents each, by addressingthe Commissioner of Patents, Washington, D. G.

